Five HR management issues to review this financial year

The start of a new financial year is a great time to focus on checking and updating your processes around compliance and administration so everything is in great shape for the next 12 months.

For many not-for-profit organisations, especially those running on a lean business model, HR administration and compliance can often get pushed down the list when it comes to priorities. However, being such a critical area and one that can expose an organisation to considerable risk, now is a great time to make sure your HR is in order.

To stay on top of HR administration this financial year, here are five top HR management issues that NFP organisations should address.

1. Make sure employment contracts are up to date

According the Australian Bureau of Statistics, the NFP sector employs just over 1 million people and engages almost 3.9 million volunteers. Despite the sector relying heavily on volunteers, exposure to legal risk by not having compliant employment contracts is very real. Part of this exposure could apply to both your employed workforce and your volunteer network.

According to Fair Work Australia, “as with work experience and internship arrangements, all relevant factors must be considered to determine whether a person is a genuine volunteer or whether, in fact, an employment relationship exists even though the worker is called a ‘volunteer’”.

It might be a good time to review volunteer arrangements to ensure your engagement of volunteers does not constitute formalised work arrangements. Genuine volunteering arrangements include the following:

• No intention by either party to create a legally binding employment relationship,
• There is no obligation for the volunteer to attend the workplace or perform work,
• No expectation from the volunteer to be paid for their work.

For your paid workforce, now is a good time to ensure you are protected from costly claims and make certain that all employees have legally compliant employment contracts. This significantly reduces legal risks if agreements with employees end badly.

Employment contracts should reinforce issues such as employee awards, work hours, leave entitlements, remuneration, and compliance with policies, duties and clear position description. In addition, ensure expectations and salaries comply with industry standards by reviewing staff awards.

2. Ensure Work Health and Safety (WHS) policies are current

Ensure that Work Health and Safety (WHS) policies are current and are reinforced in a legally compliant manner.

Safe Work Australia suggests reviewing any possible issues that may arise at your workplace and their consequences. Then, you must attempt to do whatever you can to eliminate or diminish the health and safety risks that may arise from your workplace.

3. Social media policies

Social media channels are always updating and changing. Adjust your social media policy according to these changes when needed.

Without implementing social media policies, your organisation could be exposed to great risk. To prevent unprofessional use of the internet and social media, clearly communicate and reinforce your expectations to your employees and volunteers.

A social media policy should enable your people to be aware of their duty as a respectable representative of your organisation while being empowered to participate in online activities. It should also outline the risks and consequences of misconduct. Ultimately, your social media policy should cover the policies regarding online activities and risks that may arise.

4. Check for industry updates

It is critical to constantly ensure that your organisation is up to date regarding industry requirements such as WorkCover, awards, penalty rates and accreditation.

Falling behind and failing to operate under updated requirements can expose your organisation to costly and stressful legal consequences. For example, if an employee of 10 years leaves your company after a dispute, clauses in their employment contract may not be compliant anymore if you didn’t keep their contract up-to date. This means some of the provisions could be void, increasing your legal risks if the matter goes to court.

The best way to avoid falling behind on updates is to implement a HR management system that offers alerts on legislation changes that may or may not affect your organisation or employees’ contracts, policies and procedures.

5. Systematise your HR processes

Nowadays, time is very costly. So cutting back the time spent on administrative activities can help to make your organisation more efficient. Using HR systems or software can reduce time spent on HR processes and minimise the pressure of HR management.

 With systematised HR in place, organisations can cut more than 10 hours a month on administration time, streamline staff scheduling, and ensure all legal requirements are up to date. This saving can make a huge difference to NFP organisations, freeing up more time to spend on what matters and freeing up resources to allocate to other areas.

Ultimately, by addressing these five NFP HR management issues you’ll get your organisation off to a great start this new financial year.

Barry Lehrer is the Founder of  Diffuze HR.